The level of idealism is amazing. The corrective forces of free markets
and anarchy usually discussed here are certainly in operation in varying
degrees throughout our economic "system." I think the confidence level
is naive and the damage that can result from unfettered profit seeking
is underestimated. I also doubt that anyone here has the bandwidth to
handle the information required to do it all yourself. Hence the
evolution of collective systems to perform the tasks with all of the
imperfections ( and some new ones to boot ) of the component parts that
go into them.
LOL,
Mike
"James A. Donald" wrote:
>
> If people are concerned about scrapie, they will demand meat that has never
> been fed cannibalistically, just as some people demand pestified free fruit.
>
> By and large, most people make better choices for themselves than
> government officials make for other people.
>
> --digsig
> James A. Donald
>
>From Sandy Sandfort
>
> First of all, your questions assume a lot of facts not in evidence. Anarchy
> and regulation are not mutually exclusive, nor are the "best interests of
> the community" (whatever that means) and profit.
>
> The best way to approach any sort of "anarchy" question is to assume that
> you are already in a state of anarchy and then ask the question, "what would
> *I* do to protect myself and others from this health hazard?"
>
> You should really do the head-work for yourself, but I can throw out a
> couple of ideas to show how I'd approach the problem.
>
> 1) To protect myself, I'd only eat beef that had been certified as okay by
> someone I trusted. I'd be comfortable if it carried the Kosher mark, the
> Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, Underwriters Laboratories "UL" logo,
> Consumers Report rating or maybe even a "no-mad-cow" assurance from the Beef
> Council ("It's What's for Dinner"). All of these are forms of voluntary
> "regulation."
>
> 2) To protect everyone else, I might start a business that tested and
> certified beef. It could either use the Consumer Report business model
> (consumer directly bears the cost of certification) or the Kosher model
> (producers bears the cost). Hopefully, I'd do well by doing good.
>
> In any case, selling bad products is not consistent with short or long-term
> profit. Businesses don't submit to voluntary rating/certification because
> they are nice guys, but because it enhances their ultimate profit by
> quelling consumer fears. And if you don't believe this simple truth, just
> try to buy a can of "Bon Vivant" vichyssoise soup.
>
>
> S a n d y
